Monday, April 7, 2014

Up with Geography: Angola

Country Name:
Angola

Capital:
Luanda

Continent:
Africa

Maps:

African continent. Angola outlined in dark
ink and shaded.

A closer view of Angola & its neighbors. Note that a small piece
of Angola is separated from the main body by Congo DRC.

Neighbors:
Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Zambia, Namibia

Water Borders:
Atlantic Ocean (South)

Total Area(added March 2015)
481, 354 square miles

Five Largest Cities:
Luanda, Cabinda, Huambo, Lubango, Kuito

Famous Geographical Point:
Zambezi River

Famous Person:
Ana Clara Guerra Marques, dancer

Book Set In/About:
Mayombe by Pepetela

Set during the fight for Angolan independence, this book tackles such issues as racism, tribalism, sexism, and more.

Movie Set In/About:
"Sambizanga" (1973), directed by Sarah Maldoror

Also set during the Angolan fight for independence (from the Portuguese), a man is arrested for his involvement in the independence movement and his wife visits police station after police station to look for him.

Headline of the Day:
"Angola's Top Bank BAI Tightens Lending to Halt Profit Slide" in Reuters.

2 comments:

Patricia said...

I like the names of the five biggest towns. They sound very musical.

balyien said...

I was thinking something similar as I was typing out the names! Sadly, there's not much to say about Angola as it's had a pretty brutal history. As I was hunting for something good to report about it, I read about a wildlife park and I thought "That sounds nice!" so I looked into it further and read that all the animals in the park were killed off during the 27-year-long civil war. It was a very "sad trombone" moment.